Friday, August 17, 2007

iPod 101: Fill 'er Up

Now that you've got music in your iTunes library, you're ready to fill up your iPod. You can have iTunes automatically update your iPod with songs, audiobooks, podcasts, and games in your library whenever you connect your iPod (we'll talk more about podcasts in "Plug into Podcasts"). Or you can decide to take full control over which audio files and playlists you manually transfer to your iPod. Here's how to add songs using both methods.

Now that you've got tunes in iTunes, it's time to share your collection with your iPod.

  • Have iTunes Automatically Fill Up Any iPod with a Display
  • Have iTunes Automatically Fill Up iPod shuffle
  • Manually Add Songs, Playlists, Podcasts, and Audiobooks to Your iPod

Have iTunes Automatically Fill Your iPod

If you haven't already set your iPod to automatically sync with your iTunes library in the iPod Setup Assistant, follow the steps below to have iTunes fill your entire iPod with your music, podcasts, and audiobooks whenever you connect it. If you did set iTunes to automatically update songs and playlists, just connect your iPod to your computer to start filling it up!

Fill Up Any iPod with a Display

Show Me How

You can set iTunes to automatically update songs, playlists, audiobooks, podcasts, and games on your iPod any time you connect it.

  1. Connect your iPod to your computer. iTunes should open by default (if you set iPod Settings to not open iTunes when you connect your iPod, open iTunes manually).
  2. Choose your iPod under DEVICES.
  3. From the iPod Settings that appears, choose the Summary Tab.
  4. If you want your iTunes library and your iPod to mirror the same music and video content, make sure “Manually manage music and videos” is not chosen, then do the following:

    • To sync your music, choose the Music tab, choose “Sync music”, then choose the “All songs and playlists” radio button to add everything from your iTunes collection to your iPod. Or, choose the “Selected playlists” radio button and then choose the playlists you want to include from the list below. If you want to include music videos on your iPod, choose “Include music videos”. If you want to include the album artwork, choose “Display album art work on your iPod”.
    • To sync your movies, choose the Movies tab, choose “Sync movies”, then choose the “All Movies” radio button to automatically sync all your movies to your iPod. Or, choose the “… unwatched movies” radio button and choose “all”, 1, 3, 5, or “10 most recent” from the drop-down menu, to sync just those movies to your iPod. If you want complete control, choose then “Selected movies” radio button and then choose the movies you want to sync from the list below.
    • To sync your TV Shows1, choose the TV Shows tab, then choose “Sync TV Shows” to and choose “all” or the 1, 3 5, or “10 most recent” or “10 most recent unwatched” to automatically sync those TV shows to your iPod. For complete control, choose the “Selected TV Shows” radio button and then choose the TV Shows you want to sync from the list below.
  5. If you have podcasts that you'd like to sync too, click the Podcasts tab in iPod Settings, then choose “All podcasts” to automatically sync all your iTunes podcasts to your iPod. Or, choose “Sync … episodes of” and choose “all” or the 1, 3, 5, or “10 most recent” or “1, 3, 5, or “10 most recent unwatched” to add just those podcasts to your iPod. To choose exactly which podcasts to sync, choose the “Selected Podcasts” radio button and then choose each podcast you want to sync from the list below.
  6. If you want to sync your Photos too, check out Put Pics on my Pod.
  7. If you want to sync your Contacts too, check out Get Productive.
  8. And of course you’ll want your games, so check out Give me Games.
  9. When finished, click Apply and iTunes will start filling up your iPod with your chosen audio files. Please be aware that this can take a while, depending on how large your iTunes library is.
  10. When you're ready to start playing with your iPod, disconnect it from your computer by clicking the small eject button to the right of your iPod icon in the Source pane. When the icon disappears from iTunes and your iPod says that it's OK to be disconnected, you can safely disconnect your iPod.

Fill Up iPod shuffle

Show Me How

With iPod shuffle, you can set iTunes to Autofill the player with random songs from the library or a particular playlist.

  1. Connect iPod shuffle to your computer. iTunes should open by default (if you set iTunes preferences to not open iTunes when you connect your iPod shuffle, open iTunes manually).
  2. Choose your iPod shuffle in the Source pane.
  3. From the iPod Settings that appears, choose the Contents tab.
  4. Below the song list pane, you'll see several options that allow you to control what songs to automatically transfer to your iPod shuffle. From the Autofill from pop-up menu (drop-down in Windows), choose Music if you want to copy random songs from your entire library, or choose any playlist listed to copy tunes from just that playlist.
  5. If you already have some songs on your iPod shuffle but want to replace them, choose the "Replace all items when Autofilling" checkbox. Otherwise, deselect this checkbox to keep your current songs intact—iTunes will then add songs to your existing collection.
  6. If you choose the "Choose items randomly" checkbox, iTunes will choose songs at random from your chosen source. If you deselect this checkbox, iTunes will fill your iPod shuffle with songs from your chosen source in the order in which they appear until either your iPod shuffle is full or all songs are copied.
  7. If you want iTunes to lean towards copying your higher rated songs, choose the "Choose higher rated items more often" checkbox. If you're not a faithful song rater, don't choose this checkbox.
  8. Click Autofill to make iTunes start filling your iPod shuffle with songs. Please be aware that this can take a while, depending on how large your iTunes library or playlist is. If you want to add podcasts or audiobooks, follow the next two steps.
  9. To add particular podcasts to iPod shuffle, choose Podcasts in the Source pane. Then either choose and drag a podcast title to the iPod shuffle icon in the Source pane to copy all of the downloaded episodes, or click the disclosure triangle next to any podcast title and drag any podcast listing to the iPod shuffle icon to add individual episodes.
  10. To add particular audiobooks to iPod shuffle, choose Library in the Source pane, choose an audiobook in the song list pane, and drag it to the iPod shuffle icon in the Source pane.
  11. When you're ready to start playing with iPod shuffle, disconnect it from your computer by clicking the small eject button to the right of the iPod shuffle icon in the Source pane. When the icon disappears from iTunes, you can safely unplug iPod shuffle.

Manually Add Songs, Playlists, Podcasts, and Audiobooks to Your iPod

If you want total control over everything that goes on your iPod, iPod nano, iPod mini, or iPod shuffle, you can add songs, playlists, podcasts, and audiobooks by simply dragging the content you want onto your iPod icon in the iTunes Source pane.


Disable Auto Update First (iPods with a Display Only)

If you have an iPod with a display and want manual control of your music (this doesn't apply to iPod shuffle users), first make sure that iTunes isn't set to automatically update songs whenever you connect your iPod. If you need to change this status, do this first:

  1. Connect your iPod to your computer and open iTunes if it does not open automatically
  2. Choose your iPod under DEVICES in the Source pane.
  3. In the resulting iPod Settings, click the Summary tab.
  4. Choose the "Manually manage songs and playlists" radio button. This will unselect all sync options in the Music, Movies, and TV Shows tabs.
  5. If you want to manage Podcasts, Photos, Contacts, and Games manually as well, click the Podcasts, Photos, Contacts, and Games tabs and turn off each of their sync options.
  6. Click Apply.

Adding Songs and More

Adding songs, playlists, audiobooks, and podcasts (shown here) to your iPod is a simple drag-and-drop affair.

To add songs, playlists, podcasts, audiobooks, and games to any iPod model, just follow these instructions:

  1. Connect your iPod to your computer. If iTunes doesn't automatically open after you connect it, open iTunes.
  2. To add songs or audiobooks from your library, choose Library in the Source pane, choose one or more items you want (to choose multiple songs and audiobooks, Command-click items on a Mac or Control-click items in Windows), then drag them onto your iPod icon in the Source pane.
  3. To add a playlist (which will also copy the songs it contains if they're not already on your iPod), choose the playlist in the Source pane and drag it onto your iPod icon in the Source pane.
  4. To add podcasts, choose Podcasts in the Source pane. Then either choose and drag a podcast title to your iPod icon in the Source pane to copy all of the downloaded episodes, or click the disclosure triangle next to any podcast title and drag any podcast listing to add individual episodes.
  5. When you're ready to start playing with your iPod, disconnect it from your computer by clicking the small eject button to the right of your iPod icon in the Source pane. When the icon disappears from iTunes, you can safely disconnect your iPod.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=304708
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